At least 20 people, most of them women, have been killed in a car bomb attack in northern Syria, the country’s presidency says.
The Syria Civil Defence, also known as the White Helmets, said a car filled with explosives blew up on a main road in the southern outskirts of the city of Manbij as a flat-bed lorry carrying about 30 agricultural workers drove past.
The agency had earlier put the death toll at 15, including 11 women and three girls. Another 15 women and girls were wounded, some of them critically.
The presidency vowed to ensure that the perpetrators of what it described as a “terrorist” attack would face the “most severe punishments”.
There was no immediate claim from any armed groups for the bombing, which was the deadliest since rebel forces overthrow president Bashar al-Assad in December.
The commander of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a Kurdish-led alliance backed by the US which controls much of north-eastern Syria, condemned the attack as a “criminal act” that threatened the “unity of the national fabric”.
Earlier, his media chief alleged that such bombings were among the “fundamental tactics” used by Turkish-backed factions known as the Syrian National Army (SNA), which the SDF has been battling in the Manbij area over the past two months.
The SNA did not comment on the allegation. However, the Turkey-based Syrian Islamic Council accused the SDF of being behind the blast.
Monday’s car bombing was the second such attack in the Manbij area in only three days.
On Saturday, two children and a woman were among four people killed by an explosion on a street in the city centre, the Syria Civil Defence said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group, reported that the blast was near an SNA military position and that nine people were killed, including several pro-Turkish fighters.
As the Assad regime collapsed the SNA launched an offensive to capture territory west of the River Euphrates which the SDF had held since driving out the jihadist group Islamic State (IS) in 2016.
The SNA took control of Manbij on 9 December, after fighters from the SDF-affiliated Manbij Military Council withdrew. But since then, the SDF has tried to retake the territory by launching a counter-offensive.
Turkey wants to push the SDF away from its border because it views the Kurdish militia that dominates the alliance, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), as a terrorist organisation. It says the YPG is an extension of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has fought for Kurdish autonomy in Turkey for decades.
The car bombing came amid talks between Syria’s transitional government and the SDF on the militia alliance’s future.
The commander of the SDF, Mazloum Abdi, met President Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus last week, and told the Associated Press news agency on Sunday that the two sides were negotiating with the help of Western mediators.
“Our vision of Syria is a decentralized, secular and civil country based on democracy that preserves the rights of all of its components,” he said, referring to the country’s many religious and ethnic groups.
When asked whether he was prepared to dissolve the SDF, Abdi said that in principle it wanted to be part of Syria’s defence ministry and part of the country’s defence strategy, but that the details still had to be discussed, according to AP.
Sharaa, whose Islamist group led the rebel offensive which ended Assad’s 24-year rule, told Turkish TV last month that he wanted Syrian Kurdish groups to disarm.
“Preventing bloodshed and treating everyone equally is our top priority. Therefore, we believe all weapons must be under state control,” he said.
